The approaches described in this section could be pursued, but are not necessarily approaches that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated herein, the approaches described in this section are not prior art to the claims in this application and are not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
Travel map software programs for use with personal computers are useful for locating places and points of interest when the addresses of the places and points of interest are known. Such programs also can provide driving or routing directions between identified locations. The industry has seen a major emphasis placed on tying GPS sensors into these programs to provide the user with in-vehicle navigation information. However, both the PC-based and the in-vehicle navigation programs are poorly suited for locating points of interest when either the specific street address, or the exact name of the place of interest, is unknown.
For example, in many systems, points of interest can only be seen, or be fully identified, by zooming in to view the map at a street level and scouring the map for the points. The points of interest either disappear or loose recognizable characteristics if the map is viewed at higher, zoomed-out, levels. Unfortunately, this approach is extremely tedious to use for identifying a particular points of interest. For example, a user seeking a particular category of restaurant, without knowing the specific street address or exact name, may have to view dozens of streets at a fine level of detail before concluding that the locality does not have a restaurant in the category.
Many existing the map programs provide search functions. With the search functions, a user can look for a point of interest based on a portion of the complete name of the points of interest, without providing or knowing the full street address. For example, a search query of the form “STARBUCKS” will yield a list of locations of Starbucks coffee houses. However, such searches often can yield a long listing of stores, restaurants or other matching points of interest consisting of the name of each point of interest and a street address at which the point is located. Often these are listed alphabetically. If the user is familiar with the geographic area of interest to the user, then the user might recognize the location of one of the points in the list. If the user is unfamiliar or visiting a particular geographic area, thought, then the user may be unable to determine whether a particular point of interest in the list is close to the user's location. Browsing though the list, selecting one of the listings, displaying a map that contains the selected point, and determining if the region around the point is familiar or can be located, can be a time consuming and frustrating ordeal.
An additional problem with current map systems is that they do not provide qualitative information about certain kinds points of interest. For some points of interest, additional information can be very helpful in qualifying whether a visit or further investigation is appropriate. For example, consider golf courses. Knowing the type of course (e.g., public or private), the number of holes, the fees, the degree of difficulty, etc., is essential in deciding whether to play a particular course. Having a map display that shows only the course name, address and phone number (termed “telephone book information” or “white pages information” herein), does not provide enough information to make an informed decision on whether to further pursue a candidate point of interest.
No currently available map programs do a respectable job locating golf courses. One reason is that golf course names do not follow any particular naming convention. A course name may contain the words “golf course,” “golf club,” “country club,” etc. Some country clubs do not have a golf course. In addition, golf course addresses are often vanity addresses, e.g., One Golf Club Drive. Many of these addresses refer to private roads that are not mapped and do not appear on geo-coded systems that are used in the map programs.
Other kinds of points of interest are difficult to locate using current map programs because of the lack of qualitative information. For example, a mapping program might be able to find the location of a vineyard or a winery, but the user must consult other resources to find the hours of operation, whether the location has wine tasting, whether a tasting charge applies, etc.
Based on the foregoing, there is a clear need for an improved travel mapping program that can quickly deliver enhanced Point of Interest (POI) information. It would be useful to have information beyond the name, address, and phone number data that are typically provided. There is also a need for a better, more effective means of locating points of interest, and the aforementioned enhanced information, eliminating timely and sometimes fruitless searches.